How can life cycle assessment improve your business?

Assessing the impact of your products or services could help you to:

  • increase your efficiency and productivity
  • reduce your operating costs
  • be more likely to obtain business from government bodies and large businesses that require their business partners to manage their environmental impacts effectively
  • improve your reputation amongst staff, customers and the public
  • increase the chance of securing funding to expand your business by demonstrating that your environmental impacts are well managed.

It is not a legal requirement to use the life cycle approach. However the European Commission is increasingly encouraging the approach through its Integrated Product Policy (IPP). It is likely that life cycle assessment (LCA) will be regulated in the future. Tax incentives could be introduced to encourage you to apply LCA to your business activities.

EU directives that include the principles of LCA may regulate some of your activities already. Although these directives do not regulate the whole life cycle of a product, they do regulate phases such as energy efficiency or disposal.

In this guideline: